Former Israeli Chief Justice Aharon Barak dissented from the preliminary ruling of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) Friday on whether Israel is committing “genocide” Friday, saying the court “has wrongly sought to impute the crime of Cain to Abel.”
As Breitbart News reported, the ICJ issued a blistering anti-Israel ruling in which it failed to condemn the terrorist attack by Hamas that launched the war October 7. But in the end, all it did was order Israel to obey international law and write a report.
Barak, 84, a left-wing judge who launched Israel’s constitutional “revolution” in the 1990s, is a revered figure internationally — and somewhat reviled domestically, at least in conservative circles. But while opposing Barak’s judicial legacy in Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked him to be the customary ad hoc judge for Israel on the ICJ, and Barak accepted the role.
While not representing Israel, Barak articulated the Israeli point of view in his dissent, noting that the ICJ had allowed Israel to be accused of genocide when, in fact, it was the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas that had attacked Israel with genocidal intent.
Barak dissented from most of the ICJ’s decision, except for two admonitions that Israel obey the Genocide Convention and punish incitement to genocide. He said that in supporting those parts of the ruling, he hoped to remind Israel of its treaty obligations and to “discourage damaging rhetoric,” though he added that “there is no plausibility of genocide” in even some offensive statements by Israeli officials, and said it was “regretful” that the ICJ did not order South Africa to pressure Hamas to free Israeli hostages.
Barak, a Holocaust survivor whose family was hidden by a Lithuanian farmer during the war, noted: “Genocide is more than just a word for me; it represents calculated destruction and human behaviour at its very worst. It is the gravest possible accusation and is deeply intertwined with my personal life experience.”
He said that the rise of the state of Israel, in the wake of the Nazi genocide, was a “rebirth” not just of Jews, but of humanity, and thus he regretted the abuse of the term “genocide” against Israel.
Notably, Barak quoted the Biblical story of Cain and Abel — a subtle rebuke to South Africa, which cited the incorrect passage of the Bible when accusing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of incitement, a claim that did not appear in the ICJ ruling.
Source: Breitbart